Beyond Pew's findings that Americans feel the press' watchdog function is important, there are implications here for how people learn about the news. People under 50 use the Internet as their main source for news rather than television or newspapers.
The curation function of journalists is also important to Americans, particularly younger people. The poll found that Americans overwhelmingly feel that journalists need to have a special set of skills and training. This speaks well of the profession, though the negative perception of journalists in other areas may be disheartening to some.
Public evaluations of news organizations’ performance on key measures such as accuracy, fairness and independence remain mired near all-time lows. But there is a bright spot among these otherwise gloomy ratings: broad majorities continue to say the press acts as a watchdog by preventing political leaders from doing things that should not be done, a view that is as widely held today as at any point over the past three decades.
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Scientists say they have created a false memory in a mouse, providing detailed clues to how such memories may form in human brains.
What do you think you know?
When I read this story, I thought about Daniel Kahneman's "Thinking, Fast and Slow." One of the ideas Kahneman discusses in his book is the idea of "two selves." He says our assessment of reality is the result of our remembering self, which is fed by the inputs of the experiencing self.
Kahneman says what we think about our experiences is determined by the most extreme part of the experience and how it ends. A wonderful experience can be ruined by a bad ending, despite the majority of the experience being good. (I can think of many movies that are object examples of this phenomenon.)
As we learn more about the instability of memory, and scientists become better at creating, changing or removing them, what does that say to us about the nature of human experience? Who you think you are may not be what you've done, but what you remember doing.
Researchers from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of the Pennsylvania have shown that an area of the brain that initiates behavioral changes had greater activation in smokers who watched anti-smoking ads with strong arguments versus those with weaker ones, and irrespective of flashy elements, like bright and rapidly changing scenes, loud sounds and unexpected scenario twists.
“I don’t expect it in bacteria or slugs,” Dr. van Schaik said. “But in these long-lived species that are social, you’re actually willing to give up what you know, drop that memory like a hot potato, because those in the other place do something else.”
A study published in Science showed that monkeys conditioned to eat a certain color corn switched to a disliked color when other monkeys were eating it.
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Last Friday, I had my media writing class look for three reliable sources about the Boston Marathon bombing to do two things. First, I wanted them to summarize what had happened so far. Second, I asked them to talk about what the coverage looked like in terms of news value.
Part of the reason I did that was to have them see for themselves the kinds of things people in the media focus on during crisis events. One of the most obvious elements of news value that gets emphasized is timeliness. Every outlet wants to be first so the audience will turn to them first.
Unfortunately, in a world where Twitter sets the pace, it may be that being first becomes more important than being right. Is it time to leave "scoops" to Twitter?
When big news breaks, a common impulse is to turn to CNN, but the network suffers from self-inflicted damage.
I’ve day-dreamed about what I might write in my final-issue-farewell since my first semester with The Alvernian. But now that I’ve sat down to write it, I can’t remember most of those inspirational, ‘what I’ve learned,’ cliche-ish monologues daydreamed up during bike rides home from the office....
While algorithms get smarter every day, there's a growing role for human beings in curating the Internet. While computers can know the exact meanings of words, human language contains many shades of grey. Sometimes a Big Bird is not just a Big Bird.
Children grow less aggressive the more time they spend watching television shows that encourage empathy, according to new study published in the journal Pediatrics.
— Dr. Ryan Lange (rllange) is an Assistant Professor of Communication at Alvernia University.
A new report from the Pew Internet and American Life project examines how people consume news.
One finding that stood out to me was about how people's interest in newspapers varies from setting to setting. People in large cities tended to not be willing to pay for a newspaper subscription, but people in small towns or rural areas were much more willing to do so. Perhaps there is hope for the local newspaper yet.
Link: How people get local news and information in different communities
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The Harrisburg Patriot-News will no longer be a daily newspaper in January. The paper plans to switch to a three day a week printing schedule and focus most of its energy on its Pennlive.com website. Right now, the only day that is set in stone is Sunday. The other two days are still up for debate. More people are going to the Pennlive.com website than are buying the print edition, which is in line with ongoing market trends.
The newspaper industry is at a crossroads. Young people do not tend to be newspaper readers. Generations of people have grown up getting their news from television, and increasingly from the Internet. There will always be a need for in-depth, serious journalism in our society, but that journalism may increasingly end up online.
Link: Patriot-News and PennLive.com will form PA Media Group
The U-Haul trailer was unexpected. During my own undergraduate move experience, I fit all of my possessions into the trunk and part of the backseat of a 4-door sedan.
Things had clearly changed since then.
The U-Haul trailer in question. Everyone worked together to unload the whole thing. They are surprisingly spacious.
Most of the freshmen moved the old-fashioned way. They loaded up the family car with their gear, filling sedans and SUVs near to bursting with stuff. A few people had two cars that were more modestly packed, while others had one car crammed with so much that I wondered how they were able to see to make the trip. A few people had boxes lashed with bungee cords into the vehicle to keep them from spilling out. I thought of the size of the shared dorm rooms I was helping to fill. Perhaps scaffolding or cargo nets might be a good addition to our facilities.
The freshmen had a lot in common, but no one person packed exactly the same way. They came with neatly coordinated suitcases and frayed garbage bags, repurposed cardboard boxes and rolling storage tubs, piles of clothes still in their plastic hangars and Sam's Club flats of ramen noodles and Powerade. They had thousands of dollars in computers and flat-screen monitors carefully wrapped in battered towels and retired t-shirts. Several of the freshmen had apparently purchased the same off-brand refrigerator. I thought about doing a usage study as I dragged another crate into a slow-moving elevator.
The freshmen brought their memories of how things had been before they had come to Alvernia. Some came with medals and ribbons, showing a history of high achievement. Others had neatly arranged photos of the moments and people that meant most to them. I saw several high school graduation pictures, family photos, and photographs of places I had never been. Their mementos persistently manifested in fragile, awkward objects that had to be carried, pulled or dragged from the quad into a shared dorm room. How could an 18 year old accumulate so many things? What would they eventually take with them from Alvernia?
We hauled it all through tight hallways and precarious stairwells. The freshmen and their families followed behind us, not sure what to make of their new environment. The room numbers we had to find would only come to mean something to our charges in the weeks to come. For now, we were the experts, leading anyone who would follow us through the maze of similar-looking passages to a new place.
We took the freshmen to their rooms, struggling not to step on each other in the crowded corridors. Once someone would mercifully open a locked door, we carefully unloaded their burdens on beds and against walls. When we were done, we moved on to the next person. We had done our part by moving them from one place to the other. The rest was up to them.
As the freshmen complete the process of moving into their new dorms, they have the chance to reflect on how they have reached this point in their lives. With hard work and determination, they can go anywhere from here that they can imagine. No one can know what our freshmen may become in the future, but one thing is certain: If you want a deal on a mini-fridge or a microwave, come back here in May. I'll be here with my hand truck.
Ryan Lange is an assistant professor of communication. Dr. Lange is also the advisor for the monthly campus newspaper, The Alvernian. This is his second year at Alvernia University.
